Webb County residents have one last chance to cast a ballot in the November special election.

A local jail referendum and seven proposed amendments to the Texas Constitution are on the ballot.

Voting sites in all 67 precincts across the county will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. today.

During the two-week early voting period, which ended Friday, 5 percent of Webb County's 123,000 registered voters, or 6,646, cast a ballot.

Voters in Webb County can vote for or against a proposition to build a new county jail facility.

The ballot language for the jail referendum reads as follows: "The issuance of $125,000,000 Webb County, Texas bonds for the purposes of constructing, renovating, acquiring, improving and equipping law enforcement and county jail facilities and necessary sites therefor, and the levying of a tax in payment thereof."

The Webb County Sheriff's Office projects the facility will cost $125 million. This price includes not only a jail, but a building for booking, a kitchen, an infirmary, the Sheriff's Office new headquarters, a vehicle training center, a vehicle maintenance building, a training center for personnel and a firing range.

The bond that voters are asked to approve will fund this new law enforcement complex plus renovations to the current county jail on Victoria Street and the tunnel that connects it to the federal courthouse.

For owners of a $100,000 home in Webb County, this bond will cost $44.08 annually. For owners of a $200,000 home, taxes will go up $88.16 annually. And so on.

Colin Strother, who was hired by the county to run a public education campaign on the jail and who volunteers for the Webb County Public Safety specific purpose committee, said the decision for voters is simple: Pay for the jail now, or pay for it later.

"You can take steps now to make the community safer, to modernize and move the community forward, or you can wait to do it later at a much higher cost," Strother said.

He also believes that under the Sheriff's Office plan, in which federal inmates would be housed at the current jail, there would be no increase in property taxes related to the bond. Even if the feds pay the county below the median cost of what they typically pay to house inmates, this income will pay off the debt the county will incur from the bond, and the rest of the debt the county holds, Strother said.

However, this is assuming that the county can fill the current jail, which has 570 beds, with federal inmates.

Strother said the Sheriff's Office is making a reasonable assumption that they will be able to fill this jail based on dozens of conversations they've had with federal agencies.

Just three weeks ago, the Department of Homeland Security began soliciting proposals for a detention facility in South Texas within 50 miles of I-35, Strother said.

The current jail's proximity to the border and federal courthouses makes it unique, he said, and this isn't the first time the county has been approached about building a new facility.

Strother said the voters in Webb County are sophisticated, high-information voters, and he is confident that they will do the right thing.

Former 49th District Court Judge Manuel "Meme" Flores, who has been a prominent voice in opposition of the jail referendum with the Coalition to Lower Taxes PAC, said on Monday that he has the jitters, but thinks the good people of Laredo will come out to vote down Proposition A.

Flores believes the the current jail is full because of the Sheriff's Office's mismanagement.

"When you look at the full picture, you realize we do not need 500 beds if we are competent. It would be a lot less if people were moved out efficiently," he has said.

And between the thousands of beds available for federal inmates at local private prisons, Flores does not believe there will be enough to fill the current jail and make it profitable.

"If you care about county government, if you care about your home and the future of developing a good infrastructure for the future of Webb County, go out and vote no," he said.

Flores also notes that if Proposition A passes, it will be years from now that the county is able to hold federal inmates. They will have to build the new jail and refurbish the current one before the county sees any of this money, he said.

Noe Hinojosa of Estrada Hinojosa Investment Bankers, who presented estimated costs and debt services regarding the new jail to Commissioners Court, said in a preliminary time table that operations could begin at the renovated old jail by mid-2020, two years after taxes would go up. Flores believes it will be closer to three or four years later.

Also, Commissioners Court does not know what the interest rate will be on this $125 million bond, he said.

"They're going to be housing federal inmates on the back of the taxpayer," Flores said.